


Sleepwalking

by salesman



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, Fluff, One Shot, Romance, Sleepwalking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 10:33:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5372105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/salesman/pseuds/salesman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Solas' sleepwalking is getting out of hand. When Lavellan finds out, she offers to help by sharing a tent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleepwalking

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Evie_G](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Evie_G/gifts).



Solas had been plagued with sleepwalking since childhood, and although the elf set wards to prevent himself from leaving his quarters, they were not always sufficient.

It was awful. Ever since the creation of the Veil, his body had trouble discerning the difference between walking the Fade and physically traversing the earth. So what his mind dreamed, his limbs reciprocated, and thus began his midnight journeys around Skyhold.

Usually they were simple. Opening doors, tumbling down stairs. Solas maintained perfect control over his dreams, and he never did anything as brash as throw punches or tear parchment. No, it was often only watching, talking, walking. And somehow he had kept his condition secret from most of the Inquisition, although he felt certain that some of the night watch guards were suspicious.

As he settled himself in for the night with three sets of wards blazing around his bed, ready to incapacitate him should he step out of line, Solas felt confident that this would keep his wandering body at bay.

He was wrong.

“Solas?”

He lurched into a sitting position, stars rushing his vision as he adjusted to the night. Where was he?

“Do you always sleep in the middle of the courtyard?” Lavellan smirked above him, crossing her arms with a raised brow.

Solas rubbed his eyes and shook his head. “No, I must have... dozed off,” he lied, although the statement itself was not a lie, but misleading nonetheless.

Lavellan sighed and crouched beside him. “Solas,” she said, tilting her head to the side with a small smile, “why didn’t you tell me?”

Solas raised both brows. She already knew? He chided himself for thinking otherwise. Lavellan was so much sharper than he anticipated, always a step ahead of where he assumed.

“I...” Where to even begin? He felt embarrassed, for one thing. Solas had thought his situation so cleverly hidden, only to be found in the middle of Skyhold lying in the grass...

Lavellan shook her head. “Narcolepsy is a serious condition, Solas. What if you had fallen asleep during battle?” She sighed. “It explains so much, though. Your journeys in the Fade, sleeping in strange ruins... You’ve probably fallen asleep in countless places unwillingly.”

Solas pursed his lips. She had jumped to a far worse conclusion, although his actual condition was nothing to laugh about. “No,” he corrected, “I am a sleepwalker.”

“Oh.” Lavellan eyed him up and down, as if seeing him anew. “I can’t believe I never knew.”

Solas shook his head. “I am always careful, lethallan. It is rare for me to even leave my chambers.” Except of late, he added mentally.

“I’m sure you are, but still with you, I—” She shut her mouth suddenly as a heat crept along her cheeks. “Is this why you always request a separate tent?”

He nodded. “It eases my situation.” As Solas watched the understanding register on her face, his eyes wandered down her form. Lavellan was readied for the day, even though it was definitely late into the night (if not early morning). “May I ask why you are awake, Inquisitor?”

She chuckled awkwardly. “I like to watch the sunrise from the battlements,” Lavellan admitted with a smile. “Care to join me?”

And so they went. Solas had never pinned Lavellan as an early riser. He knew her to be a night owl, in fact, as she often stayed in the rotunda library until late into the night. Solas had even joined her on numerous occasions.

“Do you have difficulty sleeping, lethallan?” he asked gently.

Lavellan sighed. “Yes,” she smiled. “I think I’m the opposite of you, Solas.” Lavellan laughed and shook her head. “It takes me ages to fall asleep, and when I do, I can’t remain so for long.”

“I see,” he replied, leaning his back against the wall. The stone was like ice at this hour, but he welcomed the chill. Solas always avoided these types of intimate moments. He knew how much his feelings threatened his plans and didn’t trust himself alone with her.

The sun crept its way up behind the mountains, bathing the sky in orange hues. Lavellan’s arm drifted towards him until her hand brushed against his. Solas knew she wanted to touch him. And he wanted the same. Yet he couldn’t. He really could not.

“This is beautiful,” he said instead. The corners of his mouth upturned into what he hoped passed as a smile. “But I should return to my quarters.” Another lie, but he needed to leave. They had already spent too much time alone together.

“Wait, Solas,” she said. “Don’t go.” Lavellan reached for his wrist. “You’re always running away. Can’t you just stay for once?”

Solas knitted his brows together. Yes, technically he could stay, but that would only make everything harder. His control was tenuous enough around her.

“Most of Skyhold will wake soon,” he replied. “You won’t be alone for long.” And he turned on his heel, leaving Lavellan behind.

 

* * *

 

There was friction between the two after that. Solas was largely ignored by the Inquisitor, and although relieved to be free of the constant tension that hovered between them, he still felt pained from the loss. But it was better this way.

So he felt astonished when she asked him to join her on an excursion to the Hinterlands. So astonished, in fact, that he accepted.

Funny how quickly they could fall into a familiar routine. Once again they were companions discussing theories and sharing stories. Eating and fighting and travelling together like they always had. But when the time came to sleep for the night, when all energy had been exhausted on bandits and red templars, Lavellan surprised him with her unexpected approach.

“I think you should stay in my tent tonight,” she suggested, hands clasped behind her back in the way he always did.

Solas didn’t need to reply. His face had enough worry to convey his concern.

“I’ve heard the reports of your sleepwalking around Skyhold, Solas,” she explained, looking him hard in the eye. “It’s getting worse.”

She was right, of course. Somehow his body was able to sidestep five sets of wards, move a carefully positioned cabinet, and unlock his bedroom door to roam the fortress. Solas would have been impressed with his unconscious maneuverings if it wasn’t for the danger that it imposed.

Lavellan stepped towards him and whispered, “I won’t take no for an answer.”

So despite his objections, Solas slept in Lavellan’s tent that evening.

The first night went smoothly. She woke him just as his body sat up to leave. It was like she had been watching him the whole night (and upon further speculation, she probably had, given her insomnia).

The second night was a little more tricky. Lavellan had to grab his legs to stop him, which caused a clumsy tangle of the elves on the floor. “You wouldn’t... wake up...” she mumbled from the ground.

But the third night was when the situation really got out of hand. Solas dreamt as he usually did—wandering the Fade and speaking with spirits—but his sudden awakening was from a scream. Lavellan’s scream. And it came all around him, shattering the Fade and crashing him back to the physical realm.

“Inquisitor?” he asked, alarmed, awake, alert.

Lavellan was out of breath, arms locked around him like she was hanging on for dear life. “You nearly jumped!” she gasped.

Solas noticed his surroundings then. They stood at the edge of a cliff, dangerously close to falling, and their camp was nowhere in sight.

“I walked this far?” Solas wondered, squinting his tired eyes at the expanse of land beneath them. He and Lavellan took some careful steps backwards until she finally released him.

He turned to face her. “I apologize for the trouble I’ve caused. My condition...” Solas stopped as he regarded her distraught face. “Inquisitor?”

“You could have _died_ ,” she cried. “Not from a battle, or an assassin, or an animal... but just by sleeping!” Lavellan grasped his face with both hands. “Do you understand how dangerous your condition is?”

Her hold on his face was too tight, squishing his cheeks between palms. “I suppose,” he breathed, staring into her wild eyes, the sun just starting to rise behind her.

And then she kissed him. Shock stilled every muscle in his body, but it was soon replaced by something else, something warm that prickled along his skin until it seeped deep into his bones. Lavellan relaxed her hands and hung them around his neck instead, pulling herself closer until he really had no chance of escaping.

Not that he wanted to (although he should).

Solas did kiss her back. He wouldn’t deny _that_. His lips moved happily along with hers—they had wanted to for so long, after all—and his arms found their way around her waist... It was easy to forget the world when her lips were upon his and her weight was against him.

“Thank you for saving me,” he sighed after they broke apart.

Lavellan raised a brow. “We really have to do something about your sleepwalking,” she said, the tip of her nose touching his own. “Maybe I’ll have to tie you up.”

Solas smiled. “There are worse things.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt Evie_G sent me on Tumblr! :)


End file.
